The rapid growth of digital communication has made it possible for all kinds of digital data elements to be communicated amongst various types of wireless and wire line communication devices. For instance, the cellular or mobile telephone is no longer limited to telephonic voice communication and may include other means of digital communication, such as digital networking (i.e., Internet communication, text messaging, and the like). In addition, an increasing number of cellular telephones and other mobile wireless communication devices, such as portable computers, personal digital assistants (PDAs) and the like, are being integrated with other means of capturing or producing digital media, such as digital cameras, digital audio recorders, digital video recorders and the like. Technological advances have made it possible for other digital devices, such as digital cameras, digital video recorders, digital audio devices and the like to be equipped with means for digital communication. As more and more digital devices possess the capability to digitally communicate with one another, the amount of digital data elements that will be communicated amongst these devices will increase at an alarming rate. Included amongst the category of data elements are all forms of data, such as text files, audio files, image files, executable applications in the form of software or video games and the like.
Wireless digital communication and, in particular short-range wireless communication, has recently experienced a growth due to the onset of new technologies, such as Bluetooth®, Wi-Fi (also known as 802.11) and other wireless local area networks (WLANs). These new technologies have provided an alternative in wireless networking over the previous fixed long-range microwave transmitter based delivery of network connections.
Bluetooth® is a wireless specification delivering short-range radio communication between electronic devices that are equipped with specialized Bluetooth-enabled semiconductor chips. It lets nearly all devices talk to one another by creating a common language between them. All electronic device such as cellular phones, personal digital assistants (PDAs), pagers, and any other device equipped with the Bluetooth-enabled chip can communicate and connect using Bluetooth® technology to form a private, personal area network (PAN). The devices carrying Bluetooth-enabled chips can easily transfer data at a rate of about 720 Kbps (kilobits per second) within 10 meters (33 feet) of range through walls, clothing and other objects. The interaction between devices occurs by itself without direct human intervention whenever they are within each other's range. In this process, the software technology embedded in the Bluetooth® transceiver chip, referred to as link controller, triggers an automatic connection to deliver and accept the data flow.
Whenever devices carrying Bluetooth® technology are within each other's range, they may create an automatic ad hoc PAN (personal area network) called a piconet. In this arrangement, one device acts as the “master”, while other devices function as “slaves”. A piconet normally carries up to eight devices. The master device decides if a particular communication service is needed from a slave device. At the time when a connection is made between Bluetooth® devices, an exchange of unique Bluetooth identity called global ID takes place. A device global ID indicates its profile along with capability functions. Upon matching of the device profile a connection is made and as the devices exchange data, the Bluetooth® transceiver chip hops back and forth among frequencies.
Bluetooth's key features are robustness, low complexity, low power and low cost. Designed to operate in noisy frequency environments, the Bluetooth-enabled devices use a fast acknowledgement and frequency-hopping scheme to make the link robust. Because Bluetooth-enabled devices operate in the unlicensed ISM band at 2.4 GHz, they avoid interference from other signals by hopping to a new frequency after transmitting or receiving a packet.
Wi-Fi (wireless fidelity) is used to describe products that follow the 802.11 set of standards developed by the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE). The most popular of these is 802.11b, which operates in the 2.4 GHz band and transfers data at 11 megabits per second (Mbps). The emerging 802.11a standard operates in the 5 GHz band and can transfer data up to 54 Mbps. These technologies have a range of about 300 feet. Wi-Fi enabled devices can send and receive data wirelessly from any location equipped with Wi-Fi access. Wi-Fi access is provided through access points, installed within a Wi-Fi location, that transmit an RF signal to Wi-Fi enabled devices that are within range of the access point, which is about 300 feet. The speed of the transmission is governed by the speed of the pipeline fed into the access point.
These advanced wireless communication mediums make it possible for digital communication devices to communicate and transfer information between devices within the wireless local area network (WLAN). However, typically for devices to be included within a WLAN and/or to communicate using a short-range communication medium such as Bluetooth®, Wi-Fi, Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) or the like the devices need to discover one another and need to exchange information in order to establish the communication link. In certain technologies, such as Bluetooth®, the discovery process tends to be inefficient and results in time-consuming connection establishment. In addition, even after devices have been discovered, typically the exchange of required communication settings between the devices is conducted manually and requires users to manually input and transmit the communication settings. This type of manual input of data is inefficient and is prone to human error. In addition to manual input of communication settings, the data that is being transferred between the devices will typically be inputted manually, thus, further exacerbate the inefficiency of the data transfer process.
An additional security concern exists in the wireless environment concerning the wireless transmission of codes and settings needed to establish the communication link. Over-the-air transmission of such data is susceptible to being eavesdropped and intercepted by potential hackers. While currently, public key information (PKI) and similar encryption coding of data address the concerns related to exchange of data through untrusted communication medium, it is unknown as to what the future holds in regards to the hackers ability to circumvent these current PKI and similar techniques.
Thus, the need exists to develop a system for establishing short-range communication between digital devices and furthering the transfer of data once the communication link is established. The desired system should obviate the need for manual inputs, thus eliminating human error situations and making for a more efficient means of establishing short-range communication and data transfer. A further need exists to develop a system for establishing short-range communication between digital devices and furthering the transfer of data that is secure and insures that only desired data is transferred and that the transfer is limited to the targeted transfer device.